Art Valley

I walked past this shop a couple of times before I realised it wasn’t your generic printed canvas shop. On closer inspection of one of their paintings, I saw that it was clearly oil on canvas. These were original paintings going at ridiculously cheap prices.
In my excitement, I went into the shop and spoke to the sales assistant who explained their simple but brilliant business model.
Crazyfish has several studios of professional artists working out of Asia. The painting designs are pre-​set. You simply look at their catalogue, pick which painting you want and a professional artist will get to work on your canvas.
The pros of this system are:
1. You get the gorgeous textures of oil paints on canvas which can’t be replicated with prints
2. This method supports a lot of struggling artists by utilising their craftsmanship, though not their design skills
3. By eliminating the importance of the artist’s name, you put the focus back on the quality of the painting. Without a famous artist name attached, the painting becomes affordable
This is not a system that works for art collectors. Although each painting is uniquely painted and will have some individual variation, the designs are replicated.
I was pretty impressed with the range of paintings available. There are some tacky pieces like the Klimt variations but I assume you’ve got to appeal to the masses. CrazyFish also has a great catalogue system at the front of their shop. Miniatures of their paintings appear on individual business cards along with their prices and order no. It’s a great way to drum up business. With a few of their abstracts and Impressionists business cards tucked safely into my purse, they won’t be far from my mind when I need to add a splash of colour to my walls.